Ordinarily when both sides in a negotiation are unhappy with the outcome, it means a compromise has been achieved. But the 11th hour debt deal reached between Congressional leaders is far from a compromise. It is a resounding defeat for President Barack Obama and his fellow Democrats and it is proof that Republicans cannot achieve significant victory until after November of 2012.

Continued...

It's easy to see how Obama & Company lost this one. They did not get their original demand of a "clean" raise in the debt ceiling without spending cuts. Their unrelenting attempts to fan the flames of class warfare did not result in job-killing tax hikes being included in the deal. And a vote on a Balanced Budget Amendment, kryptonite to high-spending Democrats, is part of the bargain announced by the president last night.

For Republicans, especially those freshman members of the House who were elected in the tea party wave of 2010, the spending cuts included in the deal are not nearly enough to satisfy the voters' mandate that government live within its means. Also, the two trillion dollar raise in the debt ceiling will allow the Obama administration to keep borrowing unchecked until after the 2012 election. Certainly conservatives wanted more cuts and less borrowing but even though they had the votes of the American people on their side, they just don't have enough Capitol Hill votes to get it all done.

So whether or not this is the final deal that will pass the House, the Senate and be signed by the president; its acceptance by Congressional leaders of both parties shows that the Democrats have, at least temporarily, surrendered on raising taxes and maintaining their obscene spending levels. But it also proves that with control of just one half of one branch of the federal government, the best the Republicans can do is block future financial abuses by the left.

In order to bring about true fiscal responsibility in government, the right must run the table in 2012 and put qualified conservative candidates in charge of both houses of Congress and the White House.

With the debt crisis almost behind us, we must turn our attention to reaching that goal.